Agreatefforttodiscoverthefunctionofeverygeneinthemouseg...

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A great effort to discover the function of every gene in the mouse genome(基因组)looks likely to provide scientists with the final mouse model of human diseases.

The International Mouse Phenotyping Consortium(IMPC)(*小鼠表型联盟)finds that it will take the next ten years to complete its task and it will need about $900 million. But at a meeting on mouse models of human diseases in London, where the project was carried out last week, scientists announced a commitment of $110 million from the US National Institutes of Health (NIH)in Bethesda, Maryland over the next five years.

“The project will explain the genes—it is going to be transformative for biology，” says James Battery, director of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders.

The IMPC aims to take mice of the same genetic background and create viable (能自行生长发育的) strains in which one of the 20,000 or so genes in the mouse genome is knocked out. The knockout strains will then be put through strict, systematic phenotypic screens, which will check for physical and behavioral differences. The information will be stored in an open database.

Scientists would, for example, be able to turn to the database to learn more about an unfamiliar gene signaled in a genome－wide connection study in humans as being possibly related to a particular disease. Making the mutant(变异的) animal and phenotyping it in a lab could take three years.

According to Battery, the NIH thinks that its investment in the large－scale programme will actually save money in the long run, because it already spends “hundreds of millions of dollars per year” supporting smallscale grants(赠款)for scientists wanting to create their own particular gene of interest.

Mouse “clinics” have appeared quickly around the world to screen mutant mice for heart trouble and to perform secondary screens to examine the changes further. But it is already clear that even this is not enough. Gene expression, and the resultant phenotype, are deeply influenced by environment, and many of these mice are raised in a stressed environment for the purposes of experiments, for example, being_subject to infection or fed high－fat diets. Much more will be learnt by comparing phenotype screens carried out on mutant mice raised in a normal environment, say project scientists.

But the launch of the visionary programme comes at a time of global financial crisis. Some commission's politicians will need a lot of convincing evidence that mouse genomics is more deserving of funds than other scientific projects.

And genome engineer Francis Stewart of the Technical University of Dresden, Germany, says that focusing on the commercial benefits of the project misses the point. “Through the IMPC, we have a historic opportunity to systematically learn everything about a mammal for the first time，”he says. “Let's not lose the vision by sidetracking(岔开)into application issues just to please politicians.”

1．Which of the following statements is NOT true according to the passage?

A．The mouse genome programme benefits humans if successful.

B．Living conditions have a deep influence on gene expression.

C．Battery thinks the investment in the project will actually save money in the future.

D．IMPC finds that it will take about three years to complete its task.

2．The underlined phrase “being subject to” in Paragraph 7 means“________”．

A．taking to B．suffering from

C．seeing to D．looking forward to

3．What's the aim of the IMPC according to the passage?

A．To make mouse “clinics” spread around the world.

B．To gain commercial benefits from the programme.

C．To create viable strains from mice.